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Friday, October 4, 2013

Sepia Saturday: Hold Still, Pal!

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to
share family history through old photographs.

This week’s Sepia Saturday prompt is the BAD photo,
blurred, scratched, subject out of frame, whatever – just bad. Fortunately – or UNfortunately – I have many
that qualify. In the days before digital
photography, we weren’t aware of those bad shots until after we paid for
them. Maybe our ancestors thought, “I
paid for it. I’m keeping it.”

As I’ve said repeatedly, the annual Jollett Reunion was a
major social event not to be missed. The
albums passed down from my grandaunts Violetta and Velma are filled with the
traditional “Group Photo” of everyone in attendance. I’m sure many an evening was spent poring
over the photo albums observing how people had changed. There’s Millard. There’s Sadie with the new baby. Doesn’t Emma look good?

But in 1925, they had this one to remember by:

Now, they didn’t KEEP this picture just because they paid
for it. Someone deemed it worthy of
GLUING into the scrapbook. They didn’t
just toss it in the shoebox. NO. They GLUED it down. Nobody was going to erase that day from
memory. No siree.

A few years earlier and miles away, my grandaunt Helen
Killeen Parker was preserving her own collection of bad photos including this
one captioned “Just a picture”:

That's Helen bottom left, second one in.

Yeah, a picture that merited a caption. And a lame one at that.

Helen didn’t stop with just the “white out” effect; she
also kept photos with a “black out” effect, like this one captioned “Pals”:

Imagine being pals with the Headless Horseman!

Please make your way over to Sepia Saturday where the
focus is on the “out of focus.” Do not
adjust your screen.

I think you win! What wonderful bad pictures. Thank providence for digital cameras & the ability to mash the good halves of bad pix together to make a whole good one, or take out or move things around to fix 'em. Kind of a shame though, in a way, because we never could have had a bad pix Sepia Saturday without those great mistakes!

oh yes, I have some of those old blurry photos that 5 should discard, unidentifieable and unknown here years gone by. A great prompt this week but I still did not get back. Enjoying reading the posts though. Good array of blurs here.

I'm still chuckling at your presentation and commentary on the photos, Wendy. We have it so easy these days. We can take 2 dozen photos in quick succession, then chuck the 22 bad ones (though many of us usually don't), whereas our ancestors probably had just one photo of an event, good or bad. I like the photo of the girl and horse. It's just too bad the boy's only half there. Too bad you can't crop him out, adjust the photo, and have a moderately good photo of the young woman and horse. Of course, you could crop out everything but the face of the young woman.... Do you know who she is? She's very pretty.

Hello Blogging Friend...Isn't it nice to have cooler weather now that 'Fall' is here. The changing season isn't the only thing happening in Blogland. Here on CollectInTexas Gal, I've done a bit of a 'MakeOver' and added a BlogShop. I'd like to take this opportunity to invite you over for a 'LookSee'. Just click on the signature link below...hope to see you there.Sue CollectInTexas BlogShop

That is exactly what I was thinking, about Halloween and the headless horseman. I guess people did with what they had, no matter in what state it was. We may be more critical nowadays because of all of the editing tools we have, but let me tell you, I still see some dreadful pictures despite all of the technology. Some folks have it, some don't!!! :D~ HUGZ

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About Me

My name is Wendy. About twenty years ago, I helped my mother research the Jolletts. Since retiring from teaching, I have expanded my research which I share here. When I’m not looking for my own family, I index for FamilySearch and the Greene County Historical Society.
Welcome to Jollett Etc. Please leave a comment to let me know you were here. If you have more information or believe we are related, EMAIL ME at wendymath at cox dot net